Archive of Our Own ^beta

Zayne

He hated parties.

Not because he didn’t like people. He tolerated them just fine. He just didn’t see the point in watching a bunch of coworkers pretend they didn’t secretly hate each other while buzzed off cheap wine and finger food.

If he had to listen to just one more person from HR talking about “boosting morale,” he might just quit and see what that did for morale.

He stood near the back wall, drink supped at but largely untouched in his hand, shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows like he was doing it all under protest and damn propriety anyway.

He kind of was. He didn’t want to be here. He was only here because Greyson had told him his presence was important to, and for, the interns. Though he saw very few of them among the crowd anyway.

The lights were too warm. The music was too loud. The alcohol he’d barely touched was already beating like a drum behind his eyeballs.

Emcee passed by him at some point. Laughing, cheap red cup in hand. Arm looped with someone he didn’t know but recognized. She smiled when she saw him.

He didn’t smile back.
Not because he didn’t want to.
Just…it felt too much like lying, and his emotions were a little too close to the surface to manage.

He spotted her across the room a little later.

Curled up in one of the lounge chairs tucked in the hallway, close enough to the party to pretend she was attending but far enough away to be on anyone’s radar, half-laughing at something on her phone, hand pressed against her lips. Her dress was simple. Black. Loose around the waist but hugging her chest perfectly.

She’d joked earlier during the icebreaker that she only wore it because everything else had cat hair on it with that same self-deprecating humor she always displayed whenever she opened her mouth.

He noticed that about her.

He noticed too much> lately.

Like he knew the color of her cat was orange and loved to sit on her lap because she always wore black leggings with an interesting concentration of fur on her thighs.

Like how beautiful she looked, soft and approachable, curled up on the couch.

She looked beautiful every day, even as she moved through life like she didn’t know it. Like she didn’t care.

He didn’t realize he was walking toward her until she looked up.

“Oh no,” she said, mock-serious, dropping the phone to her lap but not turning the display off. “You’ve got that look.”

“What look?”

“The look of a man who’s going to ask me to dance.”

He lifted one single brow at her, ignoring the way it made her grin and catch her pretty pink tongue between her teeth. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Then you’re invited.”

He chuckled softly and sat beside her on the oversized couch. He sat close for the size of it, his side pressing up against her legs where they were still tucked under her dress. He could feel the warmth radiating from her through the material. Or maybe it was coming from him.

For a while, they didn’t talk. Just let the party blur behind them.

She smelled like citrus and something warm. Exotic. Orchids, maybe. And her knee brushed against his thigh every time she shifted.

Focus, he told himself.
Don’t do anything stupid.

But the alcohol was worming its way through his system like something insidious, and the heat from her was impossible to ignore, and her lips were still red and shining from when she’d bitten into them earlier.

“I don’t get why you even come to these. You clearly hate every second of it,” she said eventually, tipping her head back against the couch and angling her neck slightly to look at him.

“I usually leave early.”

“You’re still here.”

He leaned back against the cushions and turned his head, mirroring her position, to look at her.

Really look at her. The line of her jaw. The curve of her lips. The way she caught her bottom lip between her teeth when she was nervous or curious. The way her hair fell against her shoulder in soft waves.

He didn’t mean to do it.

But the alcohol was still lighting his nerve endings on fire. And she was so pretty under the muted lights.

Something in him cracked. Something warm and stupid and soft.

He leaned in.

And kissed her.

It wasn’t messy or desperate. Just..quiet. Breathless. A single, slow press of his lips against hers. Just…to see.

To feel.
To know.

She froze.

He pulled back.

She blinked at him. Wide-eyed. Flushed.

“I-“ he started. Stopped. What could he even say? He was sorry? That would’ve been a lie.

Behind them, someone whistled.

Laughter.

Voice.

He turned.

People saw.

And suddenly this wasn’t just a stupid soft moment. Not just a lapse of judgment on his part.

This was a thing.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

You

You didn’t know what to say.

Not about the kiss.
Not about the people wolf-whistling behind you both; too much alcohol and too few inhibitions.
Not about the fact that your body was still frozen in place while your brain shouted move, move, say something, do something

Zayne cleared his throat, standing suddenly. “I should…go.”

You stood up, too. “Wait—what—you—“

“I wasn’t thinking.”

Ouch.

“Right,” you said, too quickly, trying to cover the sting of his words. Of the fact that he wouldn’t look directly at you anymore. “It’s not a big deal.”

But it was.
Because people were still staring.
And because he wasn’t denying it.
He wasn’t explaining it either.
He just looked at you like he wished it hadn’t happened at all.

And that?
That stung worse than anything else.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

The group chat for your department was already lighting up later that night. GIFs. Memes. Teasing. Questions you had zero answers for.

“YOU AND ZAYNE?!”
“When did this happen?”
"Y’all kept this quiet!”

You turned off your phone.

Sat in the dark for a long time, letting the alcohol fade and the words burrow.

Wondering and trying not to think about what it means when the first kiss you shared with someone was something they regretted.

You

By Monday morning, the kiss had become something like company folklore.

People didn't just talk. They speculated.
Whispers in the elevator.
Side-eyes in the break room.
Giggles over mugs of coffee and tea
One guy in sales straight up winked at you.

You wanted to disappear.

You weren't unaccustomed to being talked about. The whispers changed depending on the year and the room. Fat, weird, stuck up, nerdy, trying too hard, suck up, ugly, frumpy. They'd all been thrown your way since your second year of high school. But you'd learned to keep your head down. Learned to laugh at yourself before anyone else could.

This felt worse.

Because this time it wasn't about what you wore or ate or even who you were. It was, but not in the way you were used to.

This time it was more about who had kissed you at that office party. A man so far beyond your grasp that you had to have done something to make it happen.

And it made you feel like you'd stolen something from them that you weren't even aware they'd owned.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

Zayne

He didn't mean for anyone to see.
He didn't mean to make her a target.
Didn't mean for any of this to happen.
But when he walked into the break room and heard the tail end of the conversation, the asshole from HR saying, “Guess Dr. Li's slumming it now,” something in him had snapped.

Like a rubber band pulled taut and released onto bare skin.

“What did you just say?” he asked as he stepped fully into the room, voice low and menacing in a way he usually kept away from the workplace.

The room went still at the sound.

Because the thing was, he *did* like her. He thought she was beautiful, and smart, and sweet, and soft in all the ways he wasn't. He hadn't had many conversations with her, but every one always left him with a smile lingering for hours. And there was no way he was going to let some chinless paper pusher call her his slum.

HR Guy shrugged. “C'mon, man. Don't tell me that was serious. We all know how these things go.”

He gave Zayne this half-smirk, as if they were in on some bro-code secret together.

Zayne felt cold trickle down his spine and had a brief moment of wondering what would happen if he dumped the cup of coffee in his hands right over the jerk's head.

He didn't.

He didn't yell. Didn't even bother to raise his voice.

He just walked up, dropped his full coffee into the trash with a pointed look at the guy — could've been you, but I'm a goddamn professional — and said loud enough for the whole room to hear him:

"I'm dating her."

Pause.

Silence.

Then: “Seriously?” Someone asked, in a tone so incredulous sounding, Zayne instantly wanted the coffee back in his hand.

He looked them dead in the eyes, unflinching.

“Yes. Do you have an issue with my personal choices?”

No one said another word, and Zayne left the break room.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

You

He showed up at your desk mid-afternoon. Tall. Serious. Quiet. Not unusual for Dr. Zayne Li, but his appearance on this floor certainly was.

“Can you take a break?” hr asked, like he hadn't just dropped a bomb in front of the entire staff. Twice.

You looked up from your screen, startled by his voice and even more so by the question. “Why?”

“Lunch. With me.”

You blinked at him, mouth falling open slightly. “Are you asking me or telling me?”

Zayne didn't smile, but something softened around his eyes. As if your snark was a reminder he needed. “Both.”

You hesitated. “Why?”

“Because I want to.”

Simple. Plain. Unreadable. Typical.

And, stupidly, you agreed.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

Lunch found you both in a little diner practically right across the street from Akso Hospital. No frills. No fuss. Just two people sharing a booth and avoiding eye contact.

He ordered for you without thinking. Remembered what you'd gotten on the last company-sponsored outing six months ago, remembered that you had a severe dislike for undercooked eggs and avoided hollandaise sauce like it personally offended you. You didn't know what to do with that information.

“So,” you said finally, when the silence between the two of you was just bordering unbearable and sarcasm was your only light in this painfully awkward tunnel, “you kiss all your coworkers at office parties, or am I just that special?”

He looked up at you. Steady. Calm. Unreadable. “You're not just anything.”

Right.

That shut you up.

You didn't talk about the gossip and what people were saying about you at the office.
You didn't talk about the kiss at the party.
He didn't explain, and you didn't ask.
Because the quiet part you tried to drown out with too much coffee and perfectly cooked brunch, wanted to believe that maybe…maybe he just liked you.

Not a lot. Not out loud. But enough to kiss you when his inhibitions were muted. Enough to show up now, asking for your time. Enough to sit with you like you weren't a joke to him.

Let it be real, you thought to yourself.
Just this once.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

Zayne

He didn't plan to start anything.

But hearing them talk about her, like she was a joke, like she wasn't worth his time, like they could disrespect her in the open and no one would say anything or care to stop it, had done something to him. Sharp and uncomfortable. Like a scalpel slipped between his ribs.

And now?

Now she was looking at him like this meant> something. Like this wasn't just a mistake he made that he was trying his hardest to fix.

And he couldn't bring himself to tell her the truth.

That night, he walked her home. Slow enough that her cheeks turned red from the wind, and her hands were shoved deep into her coat pockets. Which was probably a good thing, so he didn't do anything stupid like try to hold her hand.

She paused at the door to her complex and looked at him, eyes squinting behind her silver frames. “So...what is this?”

He stared at her. Admired the directness of the question even as it made him uncomfortable. She had a right to be suspicious of him. He wanted to say something honest. Wanted to tell her the truth.

But not the wrong kind of honest. And not the wrong kind of truth.

So, instead, he said, “It's whatever you want it to be.”

She stared at him hard, and he met her gaze without a blink. Then, she smiled. A small, nervous thing that sent warmth curling through his belly and guilt licking up his spine.

And, because she was braver than he, she said: Then maybe I want it to be something good.”

Zayne looked at her. At her bright eyes behind her glasses and the way she looked at him, way too trusting under the yellow light of her apartment's entryway.

And nodded once.

ZAYNE

He didn't mean to fall so hopelessly in love with her.

Not like this. Not this fast.

He didn't even know he was capable of loving someone like this. Someone who wasn't Emcee.

It happened somewhere between text messages and half-laughed jokes. Between 'you're annoying' and 'you're the only reason I show up to these things at all'.

Somewhere between that first, disastrous kiss on the couch behind the party at Akso and the very real kiss on the couch in his house.
The night he'd held her, fully clothed, against his body and truly felt he couldn't have been more intimate with her.

She'd wormed her way into his heart, completely accidental on her part. But she was soft and warm and real in a world that was cold and unyielding.

And now?

Now he'd stopped pretending it wasn't happening.

He wanted her laugh in his house. Her face buried in his coats. Her hand in his, walking too slowly down too short streets.

He wanted her.

All of her.

Always.

And he still hadn't told her the truth.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

It had been two months.

Two months of Zayne showing up.

Not just physically, but emotionally.

The kind of showing up that said you were something he chose every day, even when he didn't say it out loud.

You didn't ask him for labels.

You didn't dare.

But you let yourself believe it was becoming something.

Because he kissed you now without hesitation.
Because he smiled at you like you surprised him every time you reached for him.
Because he didn't pull away when you leaned in, but leaned in himself to meet you halfway.
Because he would wrap his arm around your waist, or around your chair, when you were out at restaurants as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
Because he would wait for you in the lobby of Akso if you were, somehow, running later than him, and looked up from his phone every time the elevator dinged.
You knew this because you'd started taking the stairs on those days just so you could reach him faster and would always come out opposite of the elevator bank.

You'd started to tell yourself that maybe you weren't a joke.
That maybe it was all real.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

EMCEE

She hadn't…meant to say anything.

Not until she saw the way you looked at Zayne at lunch. Like he hung the stars in the sky.

He'd told her the truth a few weeks ago, when she'd wondered where his attention had been lately.

He'd told her about the relationship that wasn't, and how badly he wished it was. She hated the way her heart fluttered at the thought of Zayne loving someone else, but she couldn't deny that it had.

It was too much. Too dangerous. Too different.

So she cornered Zayne near the vending machines that same afternoon, arms folded tightly across her chest.

"You need to tell her," she said.

Zayne looked up from his phone, in the middle of loading the pay app. "Tell who what?"

"Her. You need to tell her that this started as some strange noble form of damage control. That you didn't mean for any of this to happen."

He stiffened, jaw locking tight.

Emcee huffed, discomfort worming its way through her belly for reasons he couldn't fully understand. Or maybe she could but didn't want to voice out loud.

She tried to soften her tone, to sound understanding instead of accusing. "You kissed her," she said. "And then you didn't want people thinking she wasn't good enough. Wanted the rumors about her to stop. So you did the noble thing. You took her out and made people think you like her—"

"I do like her," Zayne interrupted, eyes narrowing.

Emcee pulled a sharp breath in through her nostrils, barely resisting the urge to stomp her foot.

"You don't think she deserves to know the truth? That you never meant to choose her at all?"

The words hit like a blade; she could see the flinch behind his eyes.

"You didn't expect to fall for her, Zayne," she said softly, kindly, trying to soften the blow of her words even as he winced.

"But I did."

"Yeah. But it was never supposed to be real. And it wasn't supposed to happen in the first place. And you need to tell her that."

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

You didn't mean to overhear them.

You just wanted to go to the break room and grab some hot water for your tea, maybe a snack from the vending machine, since you could feel that midday headache starting behind your eyeballs before heading back to your office.

The hallway was quiet in the way only hospitals can get right before disaster hits.

Voices echoed around the corner. You froze when you heard your name.

Then your world shattered like crystal thrown against brick.

"It was never supposed to be real and you need to tell her that."

Zayne.
Emcee.
Both of them.
Talking about you like you were some group project that had gotten out of hand.

And deep in your chest? There was an odd settling.

A resignation.

That painful "ahh" moment. The one that whispered, "Told you so." In a voice that was both yours and not yours.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

ZAYNE

She was gone by the time he got upstairs to her office.

No note.
No message.
No trance.
Just…silence.

And somehow…somehow he knew what it meant.

He texted her that night as soon as he got home.

Z: Can I see you?

No answer.

Z: Please. Just talk to me.

Nothing.

Then finally—

Y: I heard you.

His heart stopped.

He called.
It went straight to voicemail.
He called again.
And again.
Same response.

Until she finally texted him back.
One message.

Y: Don't. Just don't.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

You laid in bed that night with the lights off. As if you could hie your shame in the darkness.

You'd told yourself it was different.
That he was different.

God, you felt so stupid.

You were wrong.

The shame wasn't loud.
It was quiet. Deep. Sharp. Brutal> in the way it curled inside your stomach and danced along your nerve endings until everything was sore.

Because you let yourself hope. You let yourself believe in him, even as every voice in your head told you that he wasn't telling you the truth. That something about it all was wrong. The kiss. The lunches. The smiles. The sudden appearance of him in your life.

You'd known.

Deep down inside where the shame and guilt and self-recriminations lie, you'd known the truth. But you'd told yourself it was just your past. Your trauma. Your self-doubt.

And you'd still let yourself fall for him. Believe in him. Hope in him.

And now?
Now you had to live with the truth.
You were never the choice.
Just the consequence.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

ZAYNE

He hadn't slept.

Not really.

He'd stared at the ceiling most of the night, counting the things he'd never said to her. The things he should've. The things that might've made her stay.

Would it have mattered if he'd told the truth from the start?

He doesn't know.

But now?

Now it's too late for should've.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

He found her in the parking lot after work. She didn't flinch when she saw him.

She just kept unlocking her car — the new one he'd helped her pick out before everything blew apart because he'd been stuck in a consult and couldn't drive her home in the rain one time and he swore it wasn't going to happen again — sliding her bag onto the passenger seat like he was no different from the wind.
Loud, maybe, an irritant, definitely, but passing nonetheless.

He called her name.

She didn't turn around.

"I didn't mean for you to hear it like that."

"Is there a better way to hear it?" she asked. Calm. Too calm. Like maybe she'd spent the night rehearsing this very conversation.

He swallowed. "I didn't mean for it to sound like I regret it."

"But you do."

"No," he said quickly. Too quickly. "I regret not telling you, yes. But not you. Not us."

"There was no us," she said, turning finally to face him, and the words hit him harder than he was expecting. "There was you, cleaning up a mistake. And me, too stupid to see that I was your mistake."

He took a step closer to her. "It wasn't like that—"

"Then how was it?" she snapped, the calm finally cracking like weak ice. "Because from where I stand, Zayne, it looks a hell of a lot like pity."

Zayne froze, his whole body turning to ice.

"I believed you, Zayne. I trusted you."

"I didn't think you'd want to know—"

"You didn't think I mattered enough to choose honesty."

She crossed her arms, a move he recognized all too well, and he winced, seeing it, knowing he was causing the pain that she was trying so hard to hold inside herself.

"You kissed me like it meant something. You held my hand in public like I was yours. You brought me coffee in the mornings, even when you were running late. You stayed up late texting me about stupid fantasy shows, and reading me books I know you hated when my head hurt too badly for me to sleep. And the whole time I was thinking, ‘maybe this is what it feels like to be chosen. To be loved'."

She looked him in the eyes. Her own red-rimmed but dry.

"And now I know it wasn't."

He wanted to reach for her. To pull her against him and tell her she was wrong. He wanted his body to answer for him because eh was terrible with words.

He wanted to show her how desperate> he was for her to hear him.

"I chose you," and it came out in a whisper instead of the scream raging in his chest. "Eventually. Maybe not at first. But I did."

But she just shook her head. "Eventually isn't enough."

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

You got in the car. Closed the door. Didn't slam it.

And he didn't chase you.

He just stood there. Watching your taillight shrink and vanish.

And for once, you didn't cry.
Not until you were already down the street.
Not until the ache sank so deep it felt like it had always been there.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

ZAYNE

He sat on his couch with the lights off.

His phone lit up.

One new message.

It wasn't from her.

It was from Emcee.

MC: I didn't mean for her to hear it like that.

He stared at it. Typed nothing. Because he was, once again, too tired to lie.

She was gone.
Not in anger.
In finality.
He didn't just lose her.

He lost the chance of her.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

It didn't hit him all at once.

It crept in slowly.

The first missed text in the morning. The inside joke he couldn't whisper to her.
The way her chair sat empty in the morning standup without excuse or explanation. The first coffee run he couldn't bring her.

The smile that didn't return to him.
The laugh that stopped ringing in his house.
The quiet that followed him everywhere.
She'd blocked him.

He found out the hard way — after sending a message that wasn't delivered. Tried again. Got the little red exclamation mark. Tried again.

Message failed.

He stared at it like it could give him an answer. A second chance. A timeline where he hadn't screwed everything up trying to protect something she never asked him to protect.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

You didn't go in for a week.

You took vacation days you didn't have, sat in the silence of your apartment, and let yourself grieve something that never had a label. Never had a chance.

It wasn't about Zayne kissing you drunk at a party.
It wasn't about the gossip or the attention or even the lies.

It was about the fact that you let yourself believe him.
That he could want you.
Without stipulations.
Without the weighted reason behind it.
Not because he was trying to clean up a mess and stumbled into love with you along the way.

And when it came down to it, he didn't tell the truth because he didn't think you'd stay once you knew.

He wasn't wrong.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

ZAYNE

Emcee came by a week after the breakup. She didn't say much. She just brought the bag of things left at his office after her transfer was complete. A jacket he'd lent her that stayed in her office whenever the building got too cold.

A tiny astronaut pin she left on his desk, pinned to a post-it that said, "you're not as boring as you pretend to be."

That was after they'd had a late-night conversation about a space movie he claimed to hate but had very strong opinions on.

A travel mug she'd left the day after she stayed over the last time. The night he'd held her through the night, body pressed flush against his, the scent of her in his nose, grounding him in a way he hadn't known was possible.

He'd had to work the next day and told her to stay in his house instead of going home since she was off, to eat his phone and watch his TV, wanting the scent of her to permeate every corner and every room. And just before he left, he'd hauled her onto the counter in his kitchen and kissed her like he always should have.

Moaning her name into her mouth and pressing his need against her in a way that had her melting against him, wanting him, needing him, and if he hadn't had to go to work, he probably would've consummated the relationship he thought they were in right there and then.

He doesn't cry.

Doesn't speak.

Not when Emcee apologizes again.

Not when she admits that she knew who was standing in the hallway that day.

That she only did it because she still had feelings for him, and it was weird, watching him move on with someone else.

He didn't answer her. He already knew why she did it. He wasn't sure how he felt about that part of it, and so he stayed silent, staring off into the distance until she sighed and left him alone again.

And then, he reached forward, picked up the stupid, cartoonish pin from the bag, and held it in his palm until the edges dug grooves into his skin.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

YOU

THREE MONTHS POST BREAKUP

You passed him in the lobby once, a month before your work transfer to the hospital in Skyhaven went through. He didn't see you at first. He just brushed by, face blank, jaw set. Then he stopped. Turned. Caught you in the corner of his vision.

Your hair was different. Cut shorter, lightened up a bit.

You wore a new jacket that hugged your figure perfectly.

You looked good and you knew it. Strong. Like someone who had stopped waiting for an apology you were never going to get.

You didn't say anything.

He didn't either.

You just met his eyes.

And just like that—
You kept walking.

✻ ❄ ✽ ❄ ✻

ZAYNE

He told himself it was better this way.

That she deserved peace. Distance. The right to forget him.

But some nights—
When he couldn't sleep. When the world was too loud.
When he swore, he could still smell her, citrus and spice and rare flowers, on his jacket—

He'd pull out that stupid astronaut pin. The one she'd left. The one he hadn't thrown away.

And for a moment, just for a second, he'd imagine what it might've been like.

If he'd been brave.
If he'd told the truth.
If he'd chosen her first.